For any hardcore or old-school gamer, Capcom is one of the biggest bright spots in the gaming industry. With franchises like Street Fighter, Resident Evil, Mega Man, Dead Rising, and Phoenix Wright, it just seems like they have a great portfolio of games that gamers want to play. But recently, I’ve started to get a little bit peeved over their various decisions but it wasn’t until this past week that I feel like they’ve really sold out. Let’s examine the evidence.

1. Departure of Keiji Inafune
Keiji Inafune was a major contributor to the success of Capcom, having been the former head of the Research & Development wing of the company and being one of the creators of Mega Man and Dead Rising. He definitely loved his fans, as he did signings for game launches and seemed to really help guide Capcom in the right direction because he loved games. So when he left because he couldn’t take it anymore, that was a big blow to Capcom fans everywhere, and one of the things I remember most from reading his interview on the topic was how much he feuded with those that actually ran the company and how they were very resistant to any kind of change:

Part of 4Gamer Interview:
Inafune: That’s fine, though. I expected that. But for a company whose whole business is making and selling games, you’ve got to think that development would be the key point. If you ignore development, the company can’t stand, so that’s the way things currently are.

I can’t say that I haven’t been able to make lots of different things, but I would’ve liked for the development-side to be more trusted in making games.

4Gamer: It isn’t?

Inafune: No. Not a single member of the board of directors understands games. I didn’t ask to be a board member, but if you don’t have someone who understands games in the position of making those final decisions, there winds up being a business-side that doesn’t understand games and development-side that wants to make games. I feel that’s the biggest problem Capcom will be facing.

4Gamer: It may be that way, but ultimately the ones who make the final decisions are the president and the chairman.

Ever since Inafune left, it seems like no one in Capcom took his place to push innovation and everything is now a business decision. Has Capcom gone the way of Activision? Judge for yourself!

2. Street Fighter IV
When Street Fighter IV was released, gamers were in love. This was a fabled return to the franchise, and it reinvigorated the fighting game genre. But since its initial release, Capcom has gone overboard with the number of releases. For home console gamers like myself, it’s annoying that I had to buy Super Street Fighter IV as a disc instead of as DLC for the Street Fighter IV title. Now an Arcade Edition has just come out and while it can be bought for $15 DLC, it also retails for $40 on disc? Why are there so many Street Fighter IV editions floating around?

02/17/2009 Street Fighter IV (console disc)
04/27/2010 Super Street Fighter IV (console disc)
03/27/2011 Super Street Fighter IV (3DS edition)
06/07/2011 Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition (console DLC):
06/28/2011 Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition (console disc)

(Meanwhile, other fighting games like BlazBlue: Continuum Shift release a DLC patch for free to upgrade it from Continuum Shift 1 to Continuum Shift 2.)

I’m not even really going to knock all of these releases for Street Fighter IV – primarily because I don’t really play it much anymore and was never too serious about it in the first place. So Capcom decides to milk the Street Fighter franchise a bit with Street Fighter IV’s success. They wouldn’t be milking their other franchises too, would they?

3. Dead Rising
Dead Rising was my first favorite game on the Xbox 360. During a launch time where most of the games were bland (Perfect Dark Zero, anyone?) Dead Rising was a fresh and innovative new title that I loved from start to finish. Years after that first title was released, Dead Rising 2 was released, but this time around Capcom decided to release several other related titles: two Live Arcade prologue & epilogue companions to the primary game of Dead Rising 2, and then a remake of Dead Rising 2 with a different character but slapping in a $40 price tag on it. Couldn’t this remake have simply been released as DLC? Why go the entire physical disc and distribution route when you could have just patched this in with DLC and save everyone some money?

08/08/2006 Dead Rising
08/31/2010 Dead Rising 2: Case Zero (Xbox Arcade title)
09/28/2010 Dead Rising 2 (console disc)
12/27/2010 Dead Rising 2: Case West (Xbox Arcade title)
10/11/2011 Dead Rising 2: Off the Record (console disc)

Am I going to buy Dead Rising 2: Off the Record at launch? Heck no. Unless Capcom can really demonstrate to me how different the game is by adding a different character into the same environmental assets that you already created for Dead Rising 2, I’ll just continue to be annoyed.

4. Marvel vs Capcom 3
Capcom’s recent announcement of Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 somehow managed to get me excited and my blood boiling at the same time. For one, the new “Ultimate Edition” will come with 12 new playable characters, 8 new stages, a Spectator Mode, and balance changes. Sounds like a meaty update. But is it really worth $40 – and so soon?! With Street Fighter IV, the “Super” edition did not get released until 14 months after the original title. Ultimate Marvel 3 is being released 9 months after the original title. Couldn’t this have easily been a DLC patch instead of a forced $40 disc? Pulling this Super Street Fighter thing all over again. And what’s worse is that the DLC characters, Jill & Shuma Gorath, will still not be included in the Ultimate Edition. I still am annoyed with Jill and Shuma Gorath already being on the game disc but gamers having to pay $10 to be able to use them. Since when did Capcom begin the American nickle and dime process?

02/15/2011 Marvel vs Capcom 3 (console disc)
03/15/2011 Marvel vs Capcom 3 Jill & Shuma Gorath characters (console DLC)
11/15/2011 Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 (console disc)

I guess this means I need to quickly sell my copy of Marvel vs Capcom 3 now if I have any interest in Ultimate. Or should I wait for Super Ultimate – another edition on physical disc?

4. Cancellation of Mega Man Legends 3 and blaming fans
Mega Man has a very loyal following among Capcom gamers, and Mega Man Legends 3 for the Nintendo 3DS was one of the major titles hardcore gamers were looking forward to. Different from the traditional Mega Man games, Mega Man Legends games are 3D and have more of a Zelda/RPG-ish feel. Keiji Inafune was one of the main supporters of the third game, but with his departure from Capcom and the ailing 3DS, Capcom’s board probably considered it too risky to release. I can understand this decision, as it’s purely a business one and if the game was going to take $15 million to make but they didn’t think they could make that back in sales, then I can understand. But what made them change their mind when they first agreed to release it? It’s a much bigger deal when a company officially announces that they are going to make a game and then cancel it instead of never officially announcing it and silently axing it.

Not only did Capcom officially announce and kill Mega Man Legends 3, their Twitter account successfully riled up the Mega Man fanbase by blaming them for the reason the game got cancelled. Instead of trying to calm fans down, the Capcom Twitter guy tweets:

it’s a shame the fans didn’t want to get more involved if we saw there was an audience for MML3 people might change minds

And then after that things just got crazy. Granted, the Capcom Twitter guy should definitely be fired after how he handled the situation, but this is just another thing that has brought Capcom crashing down from the highest echelons of my gaming company respect.

5. Resident Evil 4 & Code Veronica Remakes
Resident Evil 4 is not only the best Resident Evil, but one of the best games of all time. Suffice to say, I am excited along with many other gamers that an HD remake of the game is being released for the 360 and PS3. But wait, how many times has this game actually been released?

01/11/2005 Resident Evil 4 Gamecube Edition
10/25/2005 Resident Evil 4 PS2 Edition
05/15/2007 Resident Evil 4 PC Edition
06/19/2007 Resident Evil 4 Wii Edition
07/27/2009 Resident Evil 4 iPhone Edition
04/03/2010 Resident Evil 4 iPad Edition
09/20/2011 Resident Evil 4 360/PS3 Edition

And how come in Japan Resident Evil 4 & Code Veronica are released as one bundle, but are separate titles here in the states? I guess I will reserve final judgment until seeing what price these individual titles will be announced at, but if either of them are retailing for more than $20 each, I will not be a happy camper. An HD bundle with the two games launching for $39.99 would have been perfect.

Interested in a Resident Evil 4 & Code Veronica HD Bundle? Too bad if you’re not in Japan.

Grr…I always felt I could trust in Capcom to bring us gamers the goods, but it looks like they’ve definitely changed – and not necessarily for the better. In a way, they seem to be embracing American business strategy for games, which will probably allow the company to succeed but get many gamers riled up in the process. Well, there’s still Sega and Platinum Games as the remaining examples of gaming companies that still believe in innovative Japanese titles.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 was one of the top games I anticipated this year, and subsequently, is one of only a handful of games that I would pick up on launch day. Since buying it last Tuesday, I’ve managed to actually find about a dozen hours to play the game (not bad these days, in my opinion). It’s good and I want to go back to play it right now instead of writing this review. But the question is…how good?

The History of the Series and General Overview of the Game
Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is a game that many people never expected would be made. After the mess of Marvel vs. Capcom 2 where Capcom lost rights to using Marvel characters, retail copies of Marvel vs. Capcom 2 on the PS2 and Xbox became scarce and started fetching $100 or more.

Capcom’s Vs series has come a long way. The first fighting game that featured Marvel characters was Capcom’s 1 on 1 arcade fighter, X-Men: Children of the Atom. Released in 1994, this arcade game was heaven for X-Men fans such as myself when I was a kid. Capcom followed up with their next comic book fighter, Marvel Super Heroes, another 1 on 1 fighter that branched from the X-Men into the Marvel universe. But it wasn’t until the game after Marvel Super Heroes that the Vs. series was truly born. X-Men vs. Street Fighter combined the worlds of X-Men and Street Fighter, and it was a match made in heaven. Unlike X-Men: Children of the Atom and Marvel Super Heroes where the matches were 1 on 1 best of 3 rounds, X-Men vs. Street Fighter allowed you to pick two characters and switch between the two over the course of the 1-round match. The character that was on the bench would recover HP gradually, so there was strategy in determining who to use and who to switch out. Capcom then released Marvel vs. Street Fighter – branching from the X-Men to Marvel characters while preserving the format set forth by X-Men vs. Street Fighter.

Marvel vs. Capcom was released in the year after Marvel vs. Street Fighter, and not only added an interesting list of Capcom characters to fighting series, but it also introduced some new gameplay features such as the ability to call helper characters and team up on Super attacks. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 was released a couple years after Marvel vs Capcom 1, and went even crazier – it changed the series from its 2v2 nature to 3v3, and also allowed for the player to call in either of the two team members on the bench to assist with special moves. It was a major hit, and has been enjoyed for the last 10 years by fans of both fighting games and Marvel comics.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is actually very similar to Marvel vs. Capcom 2 in that it still features 3v3 action, assists, tagging in and out, but it has finally been brought to the present. Like Street Fighter 4 bringing the Street Fighter series back to the mainstream, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 also brings back the vs. series to the mainstream. The new graphics engine look amazing, the gameplay is tight, and the character selection should please nearly all fans of the series. In short, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is a very worthy sequel to its predecessor.

Before a match, the three members of each team line up to stare down the opposing team.

For Solo Gamers
For those of you like me that enjoy the single player for fighting games, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 does a decent job if you are a completionist. It doesn’t quite give you a system to earn ranking and clothing accessories to collect for your characters like in Tekken or Virtua Fighter, but it has unlockables. If you weren’t ever planning to play this game online, there is actually a decent amount of content.

The primary single player component, Arcade Mode, is a straight-forward 6 matches followed by the boss. However, one thing that extends the replayability of the single player campaign is that each character has a unique ending – and while short, can be quite amusing (I think I even saw a cameo of Phoenix Wright and Miles Edgeworth in one of the endings). With a total of 36 playable characters, that’s a lot of times you will go through the Arcade mode if you want to collect each character’s ending. Beating the game on each ending will not only unlock the character’s ending for you to rewatch in the Gallery, but it also unlocks a bunch of other things, such as each character’s model, bio, artwork, etc. In short, if you love the characters of the game and want to unlock all sorts of interesting fan content for them, you will be playing through the Arcade Mode for many, many hours.

The other primary single player mode is the Mission Mode, which tasks you with completing 10 different attack combinations for each character, from very easy to nearly impossible. It can be fun to try to learn some of the advanced combos for the various characters, but I found the later ones to not only be too difficult to complete but their practicality in usage also seemed minimal. Still, it can be fun if you don’t get too frustrated and it is a welcome mode that was introduced with Street Fighter IV. Personally, I felt that it was a little light in actually teaching you how to play each character; if you want to learn a character you’re probably better off practicing the move list in the Training Mode.

Sentinel was feared in Marvel vs. Capcom 2, and is most likely still feared in this iteration as well.

The Multiplayer
Most fighting game fans buy fighting games these days for the multiplayer, and sadly, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 disappoints a bit. Capcom’s last major fighting title was Super Street Fighter IV, and that game had some pretty interesting modes. First off, it allowed players to save replays to share with each other – a feature that is sadly absent in Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Super Street Fighter IV’s Team Battle also is absent here, and while the game is 3v3, I thought it would be cool if Capcom showed some innovation and allowed gamers to team up with friends to each take control of a character for 3v3 action. Instead, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 feels like a very solo multiplayer affair, not unlike the original Street Fighter IV’s multiplayer offerings.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 has something similar to quarter matches, but the biggest issue with the 8-player lobbies are that the players not in the match can’t see the actual fight. Instead, they sit outside and watch the 3 health bars for each player gradually wear down as the fight progresses. Apparently Capcom didn’t think it was possible to have more players spectating the matches real-time, and offers the consolation prize of letting friends see lifebars slowly deplete. It’s not as bad as a complete lack of player rooms, since it allows players to converge together, but it’s pretty weak sauce.

What’s also kind of weak (and lazy, in my opinion), is Marvel vs. Capcom 3′s Icon and Title system. Icons and Titles were introduced in Street Fighter IV and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, and they’ve been implemented very well in those games. Certain icons and titles would only get unlocked for various feats, so if you achieved a cool feat in the game, you could show that off. This is not really the case with Marvel vs. Capcom 3 – the icons are all pretty much unlocked after you only play the game a few hours, and there’s not even that many to choose from. The titles themselves are pretty boring in that the majority of the titles you can unlock are simply from beating the game with a certain character on any difficulty, the hardest difficulty, beating 5 missions, or beating 10 missions. They seem pretty bland since they are so easy to get – unlike the Street Fighter IV ones were you could unlock a lot more titles based on what you actually did in game.

While I did have some disappointments with the multiplayer, for the most part it’s quite functional and good. I’ve played about 30 or so matches online so far, and encountered lag in maybe 3-4 of those matches. Thankfully, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 allows auto-match making when you are in Arcade Mode just like in Street Fighter 4, so you can go play the Arcade Mode and wait for the system to match you with another player in either a Ranked or Player Match. Surprisingly though, it feels like the matchmaking algorithm takes a lot longer than it did in Street Fighter 4, so either not enough people are playing online (which I find hard to believe) or something about the matchmaking algorithm could be improved. I’ve gone through entire Arcade Mode and only been matched with 1 opponent the entire time – whereas in Street Fighter 4 I couldn’t even progress past one AI opponent before getting matched.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 also introduces a License Card for each player. The License Card is what others can view to check out your Marvel vs. Capcom 3 prowess. On the card you can select your icon and title, your “quick select” team, and it provides all sorts of information such as your Win/Loss record, your fighting style, history, how often you use each character, and all sorts of battle data. In short, it’s like a full synopsis of your Marvel vs. Capcom 3 life. It would be nice if there was an option to allow players to not allow others to view your card, but sadly, looks like it’s all open for the world.

When a character activates X-Factor, a red glow indicates buffs such as extra damage.

Is the Game Newbie Friendly?
While Street Fighter 4 did bring the series back to the mainstream gaming audience, it was still a very technical fighter and if you were not good at fighting games, you would not go far. I tried in both Street Fighter 4 and Super Street Fighter 4 and just plain wiped out. I not only failed to keep up with learning all the intricate technicalities of Street Fighter, but the complicated motions of the varying special moves were just too difficult for me to execute accurately. So let me be the first to say that while Street Fighter 4 brought Street Fighter to the masses, it was still not a game you could just play to have fun.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is different. I am really enjoying Marvel vs. Capcom 3, and am actually doing quite decently. There are several key differences between Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and Street Fighter 4 that make it more accessible for fighting game newbies. First off – the character roster in Marvel vs. Capcom 3 will simply attract fans of both Marvel comics and Capcom’s other video games, such as Resident Evil, Devil May Cry, Viewtiful Joe, etc. These types of players are not hardcore fighting game fans, and therefore, will be at the very low end of the multiplayer ladder – a perfect place for fighting game newbies to spend their Marvel vs. Capcom 3 time enjoying their characters.

Another major simplicity change is controls. The game is a lot easier to control than Street Fighter 4 with its 6 attack buttons. Marvel vs. Capcom 3 has 4 attack buttons – a light, medium, heavy, and launcher attack button. That’s right – every character in the game has the same button that they can use to launch enemies. The punch and kick buttons have pretty much been combined into one, and the controls work pretty well. This is not a drastic change from Marvel vs. Capcom 2′s control system, which also was 4 attack buttons and 2 buttons corresponding to each helper. The special moves are also a lot easier to do than other fighting games. One thing I love about the vs. games is that supers are simply one motion (fireball, dragon punch, backwards fireball, etc.) and two attack buttons. That’s it. None of this double dragon punch, down-back to down-forward, down-back, up-forward type of business. That alone makes the game tons more accessible since you can pull off supers so easily. The triple super with all of your teammates is simply triggered by hitting both assist buttons at the same time. It is not a hard control system to pick up by any means – especially for a fighter.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 introduces a Simple control scheme setting as well, which allows for your non-gaming friends to actually button mash the game pretty easily. It’s an eight button control scheme that takes advantage of all buttons on the controller, but it maps all special moves to one button, all attacks to one button, all super attacks to one button, etc. When you hit the attack button multiple times, it does the “magic series” combo that goes from light to heavy, allowing someone to easily combo. Special moves are dependent on location of the character on the screen and stick position – it’s all very crazy for fighting gamers, but maybe it works for our girlfriends/wives?

The major difference that makes this game more accessible compared to Street Fighter IV and BlazBlue is that to be good at this game, you basically want to be as cheap as you can. This means doing as much damage as you can with all your team members regardless of how you do it. If you can keep bringing in your other team members to assist and you have moves that can constantly do chip damage (special attacks that reduce your opponent’s health bar, even on block), you can pretty much brute force your way through the game. The game’s best players are probably those that can come up with teams and combination attacks that simply outright overwhelm you through sheer cheese. I encountered a player like that today who actually befriended me after he beat me since he thought I played pretty decently. The dude just sent everything at me and I couldn’t really do anything but ball up in the corner before getting overwhelmed. It’s a very different mindset from other games where you want to be defensive and play mind games with your opponent. In Marvel vs. Capcom 3, you just want to rush your opponent down with everything you got so they don’t know what just happened.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 introduces a new gameplay feature as well that can significantly change the outcome of a match: X-Factor. Each player can use this ability once per match, and it provides all sorts of boosts while lasting a set amount of time depending on how many characters you have left remaining. If you have all three characters left, it provides an attack and speed boost but the shortest amount of time. With one character left, it lasts the longest, and also adds a much larger attack and speed boost to the character. This feature can add a dramatic shift in the tone of the game, because if one player is down to his last character, he can activate X-Factor and do triple damage for a lengthy period of time, easily slicing his way through the opponents. It’s a very valid strategy now to allow two of your three-character squad to die in order to use the Supers of your last character in X-Factor mode. No one likes going up against Sentinel by himself with 5 super bars in X-Factor.

Supers generally take up the entire screen in Marvel vs. Capcom 3 so don’t lose track!

Final Thoughts
I am by no means a good fighting game player. Yet, I am really digging Marvel vs. Capcom 3. It has a lot of characters that fans will love, looks and plays great, is more accessible than ever before, and has plenty of single player gaming content if you like unlockables. However, its multiplayer was a bit of a disappointment in my eyes in that it is good but not excellent. What happened to all of the progress that was made with Super Street Fighter IV? It seems like Marvel vs. Capcom 3 stepped backwards instead of forwards.

I also am not a huge fan of the nickel and dime system that Capcom is planning to implement with this game. Two new DLC characters are going to be released next month: Jill and Shuma Gorath. Each of these characters will cost players $5, and then there are more character packs to pay for as well as new modes. How many characters will be released? How much will fans have to keep paying to play Marvel vs. Capcom 3? The game sets a dangerous precedent in how much it can get away with charging fans.

The lack of strong multiplayer features and a disturbing future for the game prevent Marvel vs. Capcom 3 from attaining a perfect score in my opinion. If you can get over the average multiplayer features, the game itself is amazing fun – being able to play as your favorite Marvel and Capcom characters is a joy that any fanboy can understand. The game is also a lot more accessible than other fighting games, although the amount of stuff going on in the screen at once is the biggest thing to digest. Once you get it though, the game will just click and you’ll be taken for a ride.

Final Grade: A-

Happy New Year! It’s now 2011 so we’re going to kick off this year with our top most anticipated games for 2011. Of course, there is a slight possibility that one or more of these games may not make it in 2011, as well as a possibility that they may not turn out so well. My most anticipated titles for 2010 under-delivered, but I think this year I have a lot more to be excited about. (Plus, I’m going a little less risky with my picks!) We have big sequels like Gears of War 3, Uncharted 3, Dead Space 2, etc. so 2011 is already shaping up to be a better year than 2010 (at least, in my humble opinion). Yet, it appears that my most anticipated games are all “sequels” that have not been churned out in a long time. Hit the jump to see all of these major franchises that are returning in 2011 that I can’t wait to play.

Marvel vs. Capcom 3 (360/PS3)
Looks like I don’t have to wait too long to play one of my top most anticipated games of 2011. Marvel vs. Capcom 3 hits streets here in the States the day after Valentine’s Day: February 15, 2011. The last time we got a Marvel vs. Capcom game was back in the year 2000, when Marvel vs. Capcom 2 hit the world, so it’s been basically a 10 year wait between the last one and this new one. Based on how excellent Street Fighter IV was and how it revitalized the fighting game scene, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 should be well embraced. Of course, for a terrible fighting game player like myself, I’m very excited about Marvel vs. Capcom 3 not for the fighting game aspect of the game, but to be able to use Capcom characters I know and love – even if  they end up being completely bottom tier. I just hope that Dante, Chris Redfield, and Albert Wesker end up pretty decent – that’ll probably be my primary team. Although maybe I should swap in a female character for some variety. We’ll see!

The 3rd Birthday (PSP)
Like Marvel vs. Capcom 3, The 3rd Birthday is the 3rd game in a franchise that hasn’t seen a release since 2000. The 3rd Birthday is really the third game in the Parasite Eve series, with Parasite Eve II released on the original Playstation 1 in the year 2000. The 3rd Birthday already released in Japan last month, and is on track to be released State-side around March this year. I’m not going to deny it at all that I have a bias towards Japanese developed games – maybe it’s their linear yet intuitive gameplay design, their anime/manga influences, style, presentation, etc. It just totally works for an old-school gamer like myself. While I enjoyed Parasite Eve on the Playstation back in the day, The 3rd Birthday looks to be quite different – almost more like an action-based game. If it feels anything like last year’s Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, I’ll be in heaven with my PSP all over again.

The Last Guardian (PS3)
Can you believe I’ve never played a game by Team ICO? This Japanese development studio is famous for two cult-favorite titles: Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. Both of these titles were released on the Playstation 2 in 2001 and 2005 respectively. The next major title from these guys is The Last Guardian, and it’s estimated to hit in the holiday season of 2011. I know how beloved Team ICO’s previous two games are, and I think part of my bias for putting The Last Guardian on this list is influenced by the fact that an HD remake of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus is also going to be released in the next few months so I’ll get to play all 3 titles in 2011 for the first time. But about The Last Guardian – it seems to have similar gameplay elements to Team ICO’s other two games, this time centered around a boy and a giant creature. What draws me in most to the game is the question that is asked: which one is the guardian – the boy or the creature?

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (360/PS3/PC)
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim may very well be my most anticipated game of 2011. While there hasn’t been much information on the game besides the teaser trailer released, I can’t imagine this game not being awesome, considering Bethesda Softworks’ The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion was my game of the year in 2006 and Fallout 3 was my game of the year in 2008. Will Skyrim clinch it in 2011? Who knows, but it is already starting to look like the favorite. While the Fallout 3 world was fun, the washed out post-apocalyptic look along with the mutants and firearms can’t compare to the lush, vibrant, and varied fantasy world of The Elder Scrolls. I guess if it came down to it, I’m more of a sword and magic type RPGer than a modern/sci-fi one. I embedded the video just to show how cool the title transitions to its 2011 release date.

Diablo III (PC)
This was kind of a cheap pick, since I’m not 100% sure that Diablo III will make it out in 2011. But if we go by the leaked release schedule, I have hope. Diablo II was released back in 2000 (wow make that a 3rd game on this list!) and its only expansion a year after. Can you believe that people still play Diablo II today, even in its 800×600 resolution? I’m very excited about Diablo III, since my brother and I spent so much time playing Diablo II together. I almost feel like Diablo III is the perfect game to play for someone like me today that can no longer play World of Warcraft. With Diablo III, you get all the leveling, item hoarding, and enjoyable Blizzard gameplay, but without the time commitments to all the social aspects and raiding that World of Warcraft sort of forces you to shape your life around. I’ll be able to play Diablo III solo just how I like it, or party up with friends on our own schedule whenever we want. I’m even interested in this whole Team PvP thing that Blizzard is going to implement for Diablo III – that should be interesting.

Stay tuned for Wednesday when cmfl3x shares his 2011 picks!

Some of the already announced E3 2010 titles I’m looking forward to – can you guess what they are before the jump?

E3 2010 takes place this week starting tomorrow from June 15 through Thursday June 17, so there should be a lot of notable gaming news and announcements that we’ll be very excited to talk about. While most of the good stuff is probably under lockdown until E3 when they are announced, some publishers have already revealed their (partial) E3 2010 lineups. I’ve gone through and pulled out a few titles that I am definitely looking forward to hearing more info about in addition to any other crazy potential surprises!

The 3rd Birthday (PSP) – Square Enix
Surprisingly, there’s going to be a semi-sequel to the Parasite Eve series released on the PSP! I remember enjoying the first one on the PS1, so to go back to an action-RPG game with Aya Brea again sounds great. I just wish a Vagrant Story 2 would get announced…

X-COM (360/PS3/PC) – 2K
The X-Com series has a pretty loyal following on the PC and like another beloved PC series, Fallout, it’s getting a 3rd person-shooter style reboot in 2011. I never got a chance to play (and get hooked) on the original PC games, so I’m not as against the idea of this reboot as the more hardcore fans. After all, I thought Fallout 3 turned out pretty well! If X-Com ends up being as atmospheric as BioShock and Fallout 3, I’ll probably end up loving it.

Monster Tale (DS) – Majesco
Monster Tale comes from the lead developer and designer of Henry Hatsworth, the beloved action-adventure puzzle game from EA. What’s exciting about this title for fans of Henry Hatsworth (and classic NES games) is that Monster Tale will allow for raising a pet monster but have Castlevania/Metroid-style gameplay making it a potentially enjoyable game for gamers of all ages.

Marvel vs Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds (360/PS3) – Capcom
I’m not a very good fighting game player at all and I’m ready to admit it. But even if Street Fighter IV kicks my butt, I’m still excited for Marvel vs Capcom 3. Something about seeing my favorite Capcom characters in a fighting game has my inner fanboy screaming out. Too bad most Capcom characters end up sucking eh? The newest reveal on the Capcom side is Dante, from Devil May Cry, which almost made me faint. What Capcom characters will be revealed next?!

Dead Space 2 (360/PS3/PC) – EA
Dead Space was one of my favorite new IPs in 2008, so I’m glad to see the survival horror game is getting a sequel. I even played Dead Space: Extraction on the Wii! I’m definitely a fan of the series and am interested to see where it will go next.

Metal Gear Solid: Rising (360/PS3/PC) – Konami
All of you probably know by now how much of a Metal Gear Solid fan I am. Last E3, Konami announced that they would be bringing Metal Gear to the 360 with Metal Gear Solid Rising, starring Raiden. After Metal Gear Solid 2, I didn’t really care for Raiden much at all, but he was kind of a badass in Metal Gear Solid 4 so I wouldn’t mind seeing what Rising is all about. Now if only Konami can provide us with more details at E3 2010…

The Last Guardian (PS3) – Sony
I never got a chance to play Team Ico’s first two games, Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, but I’m definitely not going to miss out on their next title. What’s even more exciting for me is that there are rumors of an HD remake of both Ico and Shadow of the Colossus coming out for PS3, which will allow me to experience all three of Team Ico’s beloved games.

This is my short list of titles to expect for now – but who knows what the publishers reveal. Let’s see what happens!

Rounding out our main categories, today we will be looking at Best Action/Adventure, Music, Real-Time Strategy and XBLA games. Looking at the list of titles from this year, there were a surprising number of good action/adventure games out this year, and even though neither of us owns a PS3, you can’t talk about action/adventure in 2009 without mentioning Uncharted 2. I’m glad I didn’t have to nominate that game though, since that would probably have made for some tough decisions. Music games, on the other hand, seemed to take a step backwards, or maybe we are just getting sick of them. Meanwhile, Live Arcade continues to put out good titles worth taking a look at.

Best Xbox 360 Action/Adventure Game of 2009

Resident Evil 5
Prototype
Ghostbusters: The Video Game
Shadow Complex
Batman: Arkham Asylum
Assassin’s Creed 2 [winner]

This was the most difficult category to decide on, as there were a lot of worthy nominees this year. Resident Evil 5 kicked things off to much controversy. Over the course of Resident Evil’s history, it has been the quintessential survival horror game, but RE5 changed the series game by focusing the game on co-op. This turned into a love it or hate it situation. For the most part, RE5 was a success, and if you are a fan of the Resident Evil series you should definitely check it out. I’d recommend playing with a friend, since the AI is a bit wonky.

Prototype is an open world action/adventure game featuring a protagonist wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt whose claim to fame is being compared to Infamous, another open world action adventure game featuring a protagonist wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt (PS3 exclusive). The game got pretty good reviews, but most people prefer Infamous to Prototype. The game deserves mention though, since it is a victim of it’s release date.

A surprisingly strong game this year was Ghostbusters: The Video Game, which is a game that is perfect for anyone who loves the movies. Generally, these licensed games are a bust, but this 3rd person shooter is a lot of fun and serves as a sequel to Ghostbusters 2. It’s too bad it’s the 1980s anymore, because Ghostbusters is sure to be a hit with kids!

Those three games were merely appetizers to the main events this year, though, which kicked off when Microsoft released Shadow Complex on Xbox Live Arcade. Shadow Complex is a spiritual successor to Metroid, set in a universe created by Orson Scott Card, and a game worth much more than its $15 price tag. Between acquiring power-ups, finding hidden secrets, and exploring the expansive map, there are hours of enjoyment to be found in this game.

The runner-up in this category also released in August. Due to its pre-holiday rush release, Batman: Arkham Asylum was primed to do well, and it made a modest killing in sales. More importantly, Arkham Asylum solidified its place as one of the best superhero games ever made. With an engaging story, a surprisingly deep combat system, and lots of fun gadgets and tools to play with, this was one of my favorite games of the year. Unfortunately, the game misses out a bit on the “adventure” aspect of things, but if you’re a fan of comics, it doesn’t matter. This game is awesome.

Finally, the last action/adventure game and the winner is Assassin’s Creed 2. First, Ubisoft should be commended for not delaying the game because of Modern Warfare 2, something a lot of publishers were doing this year. They were rewarded for their boldness, and so were gamers. Assassin’s Creed 2 brings the series to Renaissance Italy and is a resounding success. The majority of the flaws from the first game have been fixed, and Assassin’s Creed 2 has really gotten me excited about the conclusion of the trilogy. This game can take up 30 hours of your time, so it’s a great value too. Buy it for someone you love and you can’t go wrong!

Best Xbox 360 Music Game of 2009

Guitar Hero 5
The Beatles: Rock Band [winner]
DJ Hero
Band Hero
Lego Rock Band

This was a tough award to pick this year because, frankly, music games may have reached their saturation point. I basically bought my 360 to play Guitar Hero 2, but I just wasn’t as pumped up by the games this year as I have been in the past. A lot of this was due to curious decisions made by the publishers, and I don’t only mean Activision.

But let’s start with Activision. In the course of this calendar year, they released Guitar Hero: Metallica, Guitar Hero V, Guitar Hero: Van Halen, DJ Hero, and Band Hero. Metallica was pretty good, but Van Halen supposedly is terrible (though espion4ge liked it well enough). I actually think DJ Hero looks pretty awesome, and if I had 120 dollars to spend (or 90 at this point), I would have checked it out and it might have won this category due to its innovative gameplay. But that’s the problem, I have way too many plastic instruments and thus didn’t want to dip my toes into the DJ Hero pool. Meanwhile, Guitar Hero 5 suffered with its all over the place tracklist. Though the game made a lot of improvements in the interface, and is much easier for party play than Rock Band these days, it’s just weird to switch between Megadeth and Grand Funk Railroad. The game has no identity. Band Hero is basically the same game, but it features Taylor Swift. I actually think if you want to buy one of the “Hero” games, you’re best off getting Band Hero or DJ Hero, as those are probably the games with the most enjoyable soundtracks for the general public. Of course, you could always just refer to our import/export guide and play all your songs off of one disc.

Harmonix, which has been king in the music game genre, hasn’t had the greatest year either. The Beatles: Rock Band is my winner in this category, due to its unique take on the genre. The Beatles is more of an experience: you follow the career of the Fab 4 and the graphics, music, and presentation all work together to create a cohesive, spectacular experience. Unfortunately, the game is too short, and only features 45 songs. Also, DLC is more expensive (about twice as much). This is a great game to buy if you plan to play with your parents or someone of an older generation, but it’s not going to be for everyone. Lego: Rock Band, on the other hand, is probably the weakest nominee in this category. It features a casual-friendly tracklist, but Harmonix really missed a huge opportunity here to build on the humor and fun block loving gameplay of the Lego games. Lego: RB is just Lego David Bowie playing Rock Band – but it could have been so much more.

Best Xbox 360 Real-Time Strategy Game of 2009

Halo Wars [winner]
Brutal Legend

I think people are still surprised to find out that Brutal Legend is a real-time strategy game, but with a cult online multiplayer following and a lot of RTS gameplay, it deserves to be mentioned in this category. Brutal Legend is a great game with a great story, and I had a blast playing it, but the truth is it isn’t for everyone. Aside from the story elements, Brutal Legend does a bunch of things well, but doesn’t do anything great. Its RTS component focuses more on using your hero character correctly – it’s almost as if it’s a third person brawler with other units to command. I almost put this game into the music category though – its soundtrack is SOLID.

Halo Wars wins the real-time strategy hands down, and really did not have any serious contenders. It was Ensemble’s swan song, and the studio can be confident that it went out on a high note. Halo Wars successfully blends an interesting story campaign with a robust multiplayer component, one that unfortunately did not receive the popularity it deserves. I continue to be impressed by the slickness of the controls – Ensemble did a great job customizing the controls for consoles. Moreover, the balancing in the game is spot-on. Real-time strategy is all about counters, and like Starcraft before it, EVERY unit in Halo Wars is useful for countering something. Well, maybe not Brute Choppers, but hey, who’s counting?

Best Xbox 360 Live Arcade Game of 2009

The Maw
Peggle
Puzzle Quest: Galactrix
Magic: The Gathering – Duel of the Planeswalkers
Battlefield: 1943
‘Splosion Man
Marvel vs. Capcom 2
Shadow Complex [winner]

Microsoft continues to put out some quality Arcade games, and I hope they keep it up because I really enjoy the Arcade titles. Since these games are shorter for the most part, I will do the same with my descriptions!

The Maw is a short but sweet 3-D action/adventure game that has you following a cute, but growing alien. As you progress through the game, The Maw acquires more and more powers and gameplay options increase exponentially. By all accounts it’s a great game, but it ends a bit too soon for it’s $10 price tag.

Peggle and Puzzle Quest: Galactrix deserve to be mentioned because these two franchises are universally popular. Peggle is a perfect Arcade game, one you can pick up and play for 5 minutes or 5 hours straight, depending on the circumstance. Puzzle Quest: Galactrix is not as strong as the medieval entrees in the series, but a worthy game nonetheless.

Magic: The Gathering – Duel of the Planeswalkers does a great job of translating the classic card game to the console, but lacks one key feature: fully customizable decks. But if you’re into Magic, and you have some friends, the game is probably worth the $10 price tag.

Battlefield: 1943 is the runner-up in this category and for good reason. For $15 you can get a surprisingly deep multiplayer experience that you can play for months without getting bored. There are 3 standard maps to play on and one airplane only map, but the game’s maps are well designed, and the gameplay is simplified enough to make it easy to pick up and play (if you’re already familiar with FPS). There are no persistent upgrades like Modern Warfare 2, but it doesn’t really matter – as an arcade game, Battlefield: 1943 succeeds in every way.

‘Splosion Man and Marvel vs. Capcom 2 were featured in XBLA’s Summer of Arcade, and are throwbacks to former generations. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is basically the same game you remember from the Dreamcast, for better or worse. Don’t bother playing online, you will get pwned. But if you are a fighting game master, it’s worth a shot. ‘Splosion Man is an incredibly hard platformer with a unique presence: you “blow yourself up” to jump which leads to all sorts of puzzles. Just make sure there aren’t any windows nearby, you might throw your controller out of it.

Topping all of these quality games, Shadow Complex is the champion in this category. I chose Shadow Complex as the winner not only for the reasons outlined above in the Action/Adventure category, but also because it’s the best value out of all of these games (Battlefield: 1943 or Peggle are the only competition). It’s a great game, and one every Metroid fan should not hesitate to check out.

It’s that time of the year again…as 2009 draws to a close and the holiday season is upon us, cmfl3x and I decided that we wanted to do our own “Leveling Down” gaming awards for 2009 where we choose winners in several categories for Xbox 360 games that have been released in 2009. At the same time, we also wanted to preserve the holiday shopping guide that Leveling Down produced last year but felt that the awards and the shopping guide were too similar.

Instead of separate 2009 awards and holiday shopping guide posts, we’ve decided to combine them this year into one. Every game we’ve nominated within our awards are games worth considering for the holidays, but at the same time, we’re also declaring the winner. Consider the awards as, if you can only buy one game from the nominees of the category, buy the winner. But if you are further interested in other games from the category, you should definitely pick them up as well as they have aspects that all make them worth considering. Game boxes have been provided for all nominees, and all of them link to Amazon, our gaming retailer of the year due to not only their ridiculous gaming deals, but their constant vigilance in price matching practically all competitors.

Our 2009 awards/shopping guide will span all week, with cmfl3x and me alternating posts and writing about a few categories each day. This will culminate on Friday when we both share our own nominations for Game of the Year, and our picks for Game of the Year. I will kick things off today with three categories: 2009′s Best Fighting Game, Best Role Playing Game, and Best First Person Shooter for the Xbox 360.

Best Xbox 360 Fighting Game of 2009

Street Fighter IV [winner]
BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger
Marvel vs Capcom 2
Tekken 6

It’s hard to believe that Street Fighter IV released this year since it was back in February that the game came out. Compared to the other fighting games that were released in 2009, Street Fighter IV reigns supreme. It is THE sequel to Street Fighter II for many of us that grew up with the game, and jumped off the band wagon once Street Fighter III came out. It unites fans of the classic Street Fighter games with fans of the more current Street Fighter games – a remarkable feat. The roster is huge and full of fan favorites, the gameplay is simple to learn yet deep enough to be played at a competitive level, the graphics are truly revolutionary and fitting for this generation, and the excellent matchmaking allows fans to play the game competitively from the comfort of their own homes. In short, it’s easy to understand why Street Fighter IV is our 2009 fighting game of the year.

BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger is our runner up for fighting game of the year. Developed by the makers of Guilty Gear, BlazBlue came out of nowhere for me and after I picked it up and played it, I had a great time. The game is fresh with completely new characters, contains very functional matchmaking, and a single player mode that has players really learning about the storyline and background of each character. I would have liked to see more characters, as BlazBlue’s playable roster doesn’t compare to Street Fighter IV’s, but the game should be next on your list to buy if you’re a fighting game fan and Street Fighter IV has lost its appeal for you.

Marvel vs Capcom 2 is a $15 Xbox Live Arcade title, and while it’s worth mentioning here as a fighting game to look into, it is beginning to show its age. All the craziness of the game is still there and matchmaking works online, but at this rate you’re either still a fan or have moved on. Today’s fighting games are a bit less frenetic, but if jonesin’ to play as Spiderman and Wolverine once again, Marvel vs Capcom 2 will deliver. Just be aware that the character list is quite unbalanced and you may get frustrated playing online against others that have been playing it for many years.

Tekken 6 is the last fighting game to be released in 2009 worth considering for fighting game fans. At its initial launch, the game’s online was terrible but over Thanksgiving Namco has since released a patch to alleviate the problems. I haven’t played the Tekken games since the PS2, but I have picked up Tekken 6 and plan to delve into it later this month. The game has a huge roster of characters, but for some reason or another, its core gameplay has never really resonated with me compared to other fighting games. Tekken tends to focus more on juggling combos than traditional combos, and has single-player departures that tend to suck. Tekken 6 appears to be no different. I don’t see much innovation in this game compared to Street Fighter IV and BlazBlue, the other stronger titles in this category. Still, it’s the only 3D fighter released this year, so if you prefer that to 2D fighters, this is the game to get.

Best Xbox 360 Role Playing Game of 2009

Star Ocean: The Last Hope
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition
Magna Carta 2
Dragon Age: Origins [winner]

2009 was a tough year for role playing game fans on the Xbox 360. After the deluge of titles from Mystwalker and Square Enix in the past, we’re left with just one pure Japanese RPG released in 2009: Star Ocean: The Last Hope. I actually owned this game for a while, and tried it out for a bit. It’s not a bad game, as it follows traditional J-RPG classic RPG design. If you like J-RPGs and the idea of spending hundreds of hours in a sci-fi based one, Star Ocean 4 is worth considering – even if the reviews of the game are less than stellar. It seems like American reviewers don’t really enjoy J-RPG games much these days, as they didn’t score Lost Odyssey too highly either so if you liked games like Lost Odyssey, perhaps Star Ocean: The Last Hope may also provide you with similar enjoyment.

Sacred 2 was a 360 port originally released on the PC. I tried out the PC demo and while it was decent, I wasn’t going to seriously play it enough to get it. It’s gotten mixed reviews, but it resonates strongly with the right crowd. If you’re a Diablo fan and enjoy collecting loot in an action-RPG style game, Sacred 2 is the only game you’ll be able to play this year on the 360 that can handle that. However, there are inherent technical issues with the game, with complaints such as slowdown, interface problems, and other minor things that account for a lack of presentation. Players also complain about the lack of a pause feature. But, if you want an action-RPG game to play on the 360, this is most likely the primary replacement to Too Human.

Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition I mention here only because it was released this year. With it being our pick for 2008′s game of the year, it cannot seriously be considered as a competitor for this year. Having said that, if you have not played the game yet, this is the definitive title to get as the game of the year edition contains all five released downloadable content that would have cost players $50 or so alone for just downloading. The most important part of the DLC is that it raises the level cap from 20 to 30, ensuring a much lengthier experience you can enjoy in the world of Fallout 3.

Magna Carta 2 is a Korean developed J-RPG game, and I say “J-RPG” because the developers have created it specifically adhering to Japanese RPG game design. However, the game actually plays more like an action-RPG, and is very reminiscent of Infinite Undiscovery. Sadly, Infinite Undiscovery and Magna Carta 2 were devastated by american reviewers. I personally enjoyed Infinite Undiscovery a lot, and because of that I’ve already picked up Magna Carta 2. There are still fans for both games, and there seem to be more fans of Magna Carta 2 than I would have thought. So with Magna Carta 2, perhaps it’s worth not listening to the reviewers if this type of game interests you.

The final nominee we have for best 360 role playing game of 2009 is Dragon Age: Origins. Compared to the other games, it was easy to realize that Dragon Age: Origins would be our winner even though neither cmfl3x and I have even played through it yet. It’s in my backlog (like practically every other big game released this holiday season), but I’ve read enough about it and even played the web-based game to understand what it’s going for. To be honest, it wins by default because Fallout 3: GotY is ineligible, and the other three RPG games are good for only certain types of RPG fan types, while Dragon Age: Origins brings it all together. If you are simply a general RPG fan, Dragon Age: Origins is the game to buy. The game is quite lengthy, has a deep storyline, and is developed by the team behind RPG greats such as Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic, Mass Effect, and the game is considered the spiritual successor to the PC franchise Baldur’s Gate. The one big negative to the game appears to be the graphics. The game looks gorgeous on the PC, but on the 360 version, complaints seem to condemn the game as having Xbox 1 level graphics. I’m sure they can’t be that bad, but that is perhaps the biggest thing to consider. Most people recommend picking the PC version if possible but if the 360 is all you got, it’s still the best RPG game of this year.

Best Xbox 360 First Person Shooter of 2009

Battlefield 1943
Halo 3: ODST
Borderlands
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 [winner]
Left 4 Dead 2

What defines what is the best first person shooter of the year? Of course it would have to be played in first person, but what I’m thinking about is when one is shopping for a gamer who doesn’t have any of this year’s top FPS games and is a FPS fan, the winner of this category is the game to get. Which is the overall package that will delight a FPS fan?

Battlefield 1943 is an Xbox Live Arcade only title, and while it has a hard time comparing to the other games on this nominee list, it holds its own as quite an enjoyable Live Arcade title. The game released in the summer of 2009 for $15, and prior to that, there had been no other online FPS game for fans to engage in. Battlefield 1943 definitely scratched the itch, as it brought the core Battlefield Conquest gameplay back, with three different land maps and an air map. Does it still hold up compared to this holiday season’s titles? Not really, but for a fraction of the cost, it’s still worth checking out for multiplayer FPS fans.

Halo 3: ODST did not release to rave reviews like its predecessors. It did some interesting things with the “open world” campaign and Firefight modes, but many felt that its $59.99 price tag was far too high for what it provided: a 6 hour campaign, co-op Firefight without matchmaking, and all of the Halo 3 multiplayer with all DLC maps and three new ones. Most fans of Halo already had Halo 3, so while it sounds like a good deal for those completely new to Halo, people were upset that they were spending $60 to complete a short campaign and play Firefight. The game did not have legs, and many players have already moved onto either Modern Warfare 2 or Left 4 Dead 2. Is it a good game? Sure it’s worth playing if you’re a Halo fan and the Firefight mode is a lot of fun with friends. But with no truely new multiplayer component, it’s a game that will most likely gather dust once you’ve gone through it.

Borderlands is more of a mixture between FPS and RPG, as you play the game in first person and shoot guns but you have to adhere to RPG principles like finding new weapons for damage upgrades and taking into account damage increases and reduction due to player and enemy level differences. Borderlands proves that this mixture between FPS and RPG works brilliantly, and for fans of both genres, the game is worth picking up. Unfortunately, like Halo 3: ODST, it doesn’t seem to be a game that has legs. It’s quite lengthier than Halo 3: ODST (at about 25 hours for each playthrough, with 2 playthroughs required to max out at level 50), and even provides 4-player co-op, but the RPG limitations prevent co-op from really being possible unless you have a dedicated crew that will only play it together at the exact same time.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is the juggernaut in this list, and easily the winner of this category due to it being a more complete package than any other FPS on this list. If you want to play the game’s multiplayer, it’s awesome and has so many things going on that you could be engaged with it for months or years. There’s so much going on that I’ve even had to write a guide for it, and it’s so fun that even when you die you can’t help but keep coming back. At the same time, the campaign, while a bit on the short side at 6 hours, is also quite a thrillride from start to finish with a storyline that has you on the edge of your seat at practically every level. Still on top of that, if you wanted even more from the game, there’s an entirely new mode called Special Ops that consists of over 20 levels that you can play through co-op with a friend. These levels are quite enjoyable, ranging from one player in an AC-130 covering another player as he makes his way across the map to both players holding out together against several waves of increasingly difficult enemies. In all, Modern Warfare 2 is the First Person Shooter of 2009, and should not be missed. It has practically everything a first person shooter fan could ever want.

Left 4 Dead 2 was released one week after Modern Warfare 2, and amusingly enough, I am now writing about it in the paragraph after gushing about how amazing Modern Warfare 2 is and why it won. Left 4 Dead 2 actually pulls second in this category for 2009, as it brings more to the table over its predecessor: more special infected zombies, more weapons, more levels, longer levels, more adversarial modes, increased difficulty, and the list goes on. Of course, whether it was all necessary is questionable by fans of the original but I will definitely admit that if I ever get tired of Modern Warfare 2, I can see Left 4 Dead 2 carrying my FPS burden until Battlefield: Bad Company 2 releases in March. My recommendation is to pick up Modern Warfare 2 & Left 4 Dead 2, but if it can only be one for your FPS fan, it’s Modern Warfare 2 all the way.

Stay tuned tomorrow when cmfl3x presents our next categories!

Even though LargeLobster and Jason both recommended against picking up the 360 version of Marvel vs Capcom 2 when it was originally released, I ended up going for it anyways since I realized there’s a trick for buying a Live Arcade game once for two different people. $15 total for my brother and me to have the game on each of our systems? I’ve bought worse I thought, so I pulled the trigger. After playing it a few rounds with my brother and seeing online, I think I’m already done with it and should have followed LargeLobster’s advice by simply breaking it out on the DC to relive my nostalgia, even with my lack of arcade sticks on the DC.

Here is what transpired over the two hours of my brother and me playing once we bought the game:
1. My brother and I gleefully pick all sorts of teams from the 56 characters and spar, reliving our nostalgia with various characters
2. We begin settling on main teams that we would use for online play – my team being: Omega Red, Cyclops, and Doctor Doom, and his being Amingo, Iceman, and Cable.
3. We continue playing with our main teams against each other for a while until I’m done being flattened by him and he feels confident enough to play unranked online.
4. He joins his first Player match against another player who also mains with Amingo, and gets taken out without the other player even losing a guy.
5. He joins another game with several people in the room, and we witness one guy who picks Magneto, Sentinel and Storm and practically gets a perfect against the other guy with just Magneto.
6. We leave the room, and turn off the game.
7. We don’t speak of Marvel vs Capcom 2 again.

In our little time playing the game, we didn’t notice any of the glitches that Jason mentioned - but of course, we never played it as competitively as Jason did (or does?). What was evident to me was that I was along LargeLobster’s mindset: the game is just too ridiculously crazy. It’s too fast, there’s too much stuff going on, and then the game is over. Maybe in my youth, I would have kept up better, but now I feel like an old geezer trying to not only attack the opponent, but throw out my assist characters, deal with the opponent’s assist characters, air combo, throw supers, etc. My brother fared better due to his innate fighting game skill, but even he seemed to indicate to me that this was one game he didn’t have the patience to get competitive with.

I guess this game’s “re-release” really appeals to two groups of people: those that were competitive players of the game in the first place, and those that just love the characters and want to play for fun. It’s when the two sides meet that things get ugly – and now they can meet thanks to online play. For us, we were opened up to the hardcore side immediately, scaring us away from the game potentially for good. My nostalgia with Marvel vs Capcom 2 is over, brutally destroyed by Magneto. There are people that have played this game for almost a decade!

For the record, I loved the game back in college when my buddies and I spent hundreds of hours playing it on the Dreamcast. In fact, we loved playing all of the versus games back in college, but back then, we were all just college kids playing for fun and there were always a lot of us to play with so there was a ton of variety in our matchups.

Now that Marvel vs Capcom 2 has been released on the 360 and is getting pretty good reviews (unlike King of Fighters XII, which is apparently getting destroyed in reviews), I’m considering purchasing it. I downloaded the demo to check it out, and it features just 2-player offline combat with six characters. Not really enough to be a game, but enough to see how the engine holds up in this new generation of TVs and I will say that it looks fine. The gameplay is really frenetic though, and I’ve forgotten how over the top it was with air combos into supers and all that.

The reason I’m most interested in the game is nostalgia. I loved the Marvel vs. Capcom fighting game universe that Capcom created, and enjoy playing with characters like Jill, Omega Red, and several of the X-Men. It’s disheartening to see that of the 50 or so selectable characters, only a small fraction of that number is actually considered playable at a competitive level. So while I want to reminisce with characters I enjoy, if I were to play the game long enough, all I’d probably end up seeing are Magneto, Cable, Storm, and Sentinel. This game is 9 years old – and it’s pretty much established already. At this point, if I want to invest enough into the game, I will have to either figure out a way to beat Magneto’s infinite with my low-tier characters, or learn to play Magneto myself. Not a huge fan of either decision. Blah…

But it’s only $15 right? Hrm, even after writing this, I’m still on the fence. Maybe I should get through BlazBlue first before picking up another fighting game. And maining Carl Clover is certainly helping with the possible transition to Marvel vs Capcom 2.

My brother was in the NYC Chinatown arcade this past weekend, and noticed that the Street Fighter IV cabinets were practically empty while players were crowded around the Tekken 6 and BlazBlue cabinets. I’m a little surprised to hear that myself, but if BlazBlue is popular in the arcades, then it obviously has something going for it. This game is basically the sequel to Guilty Gear, with interesting character design, great presentation, memorable rock music, and a deep fighting engine. It’s a great fighting game if you’re willing to take the time learn it.

Before buying the game, I was reading impressions from different buyers of the games and everyone practically loves it. Even casual players were gushing compliments about the game and I found the character designs interesting so I jumped in. I told my brother I picked it up and the first thing he said was, “Wow – you know that it’s a pretty difficult game right?” After playing it for hours now, I have to agree. It’s more difficult than Street Fighter IV. I’m guessing this may be due to us playing Street Fighter games for over a decade now, making Street Fighter IV quite intuitive. But BlazBlue is something else. It’s safe to say that this is NOT a good game for fighting game newbies to pick up, as cool as it may seem. I’d even go so far as to recommend Street Fighter IV for fighting game newbies over this one. BlazBlue is very offensive oriented, with lengthy combos, air juggles, and traps and penalties for blocking too much. It’s almost like a cross between Street Fighter IV and Marvel vs Capcom 2, blending some of the simpleness of the former with the craziness of the latter.

The selection of 12 characters in the game seems meager, but each one plays very uniquely so it’s not like half of them are shoto characters. Sadly, I’d go so far as to say that some of the characters are a bit overpowered, and it’s probably why they’re used so often online. There are four attack buttons: a light, mid, and strong attack and a Drive attack button. The Drive button is what completely differentiates each character, as it functions quite differently depending on the character’s unique trait or weapon. For example, one character uses the Drive button to control his mech that accompanies him, similar to a helper in the Marvel vs Capcom games. Another character uses the D button to control wind, altering the direction that the players move on screen. A third character uses that D button for special attacks that allow him to steal life from the opponent. The list goes on. All in all, very drastic differences in how each character plays based on their Drive ability.

BlazBlue’s online is better and worse than Street Fighter IV’s online. On the better side, it allows for 6 player rooms for Player matches, allowing groups of buddies to “quarter match” it up, something drastically missing in Street Fighter IV. In the ”meh” side, you have a ranking level based on experience tied to both Player Matches and Ranked Matches. So even if you were to just play Player Matches, you would still level up. There’s a “Trueskill ranking” as well, and perhaps that is what is used for Ranked Matches but I’m not sure. I’m not a fan of any sort of “rank progression” based on unranked games, as it defeats the purpose, but it’s not a deal-breaker. What kind of sucks is when you play someone in a ranked game, both player’s stats for both ranked and unranked matches are displayed, which again, annoy me since unranked should just be that: unranked and not counted in any way. And on the bad side, it seems to take quite a long time to find ranked games, especially so if you’re just looking for  a match in the low ranks. It looks like now that the game has been out for over a month, not many low level players are left in the game but that seems to be the case with many hardcore fighting games. I do miss Street Fighter IV’s auto-matchmaking mode where you could play while waiting to get matched up.

While I believe BlazBlue to be a great fighting game, the only issue I have is that the game is perhaps too tough for me. However, my brother is starting to dig it as he’s been devoting time to understanding the nuances of the game and he’s been helping me get better too. I’m lacking in so many fighting game fundamentals that it helps considerably when he is able to go over my character’s moveset and tell me what’s good for poking, what should be my bread and butter attacks, etc. I’ve never been able to figure that stuff out on my own but I’m thankful that he’s around so I’m catching onto the game. If I were just playing this by myself, it would probably already be thrown back onto the shelf by now! So I guess I can conclude my impressions of the game as this: if you’re willing to devote your time to learning this game, you won’t be sorry as it has practically everything a serious fighting game fan could want: interesting characters, top-notch presentation, and a functional and lag-free online mode.

Looks like this month is the biggest 2D fighting game month of the year, and that’s saying something considering Street Fighter IV’s console release back in February kicked off the year. Why is July 2009 so significant for 2D fighting game fans on the 360/PS3?

07/01: BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger Limited Edition
07/21: King of Fighters XII
07/29: BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger Regular Edition
07/29: Marvel vs Capcom 2

I was on the fence about purchasing the recently released BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger. While it’s scoring highly in reviews, I know that deep down I’m just not a hardcore fighting gamer. I tried for a couple months to get competitively good at Street Fighter IV, but as I expected, I just didn’t have enough patience or drive to learn it. And if Street Fighter can’t get me to want to play competitively online, can anything else?

Still, I like the fresh start that BlazBlue will give me: completely new characters so I won’t be stuck with a shoto or fighting shotos, a fresh new combat system to learn, and while 12 characters seems like a meager list to choose from, it should allow me to learn the game a lot quicker so it’s a boon in a sense. I am also digging the artistic style to the game – reminds me a little bit of Darkstalkers but of course this game is running on the Guilty Gear engine.

After reading Sirlin’s Playing to Win though, I was inspired enough to buy BlazBlue. Maybe this game will be the 2D fighting game that I can actually get into and excel at. Or if anything, it’ll at least be another game my younger brother can come kick my butt in when he visits next month.